


Pebble in the Sky

by Stephquiem



Series: Going Back [7]
Category: Animorphs (TV), Animorphs - Katherine A. Applegate
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canon Divergence, Canon-Compliant Jerk Moves, Dysfunctional Relationships, Excessive Swearing, F/M, Self-Insert, a family can be a teenager a parasite and a robot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-28
Updated: 2019-07-17
Packaged: 2019-11-15 19:08:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,625
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18079223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stephquiem/pseuds/Stephquiem
Summary: A further series of one-shots taking place in the Going Back universe.Takes place between #25 The Extreme and #30 The Reunion.





	1. Sunbeam

**_Steph_ **

When Erek came home, he found me lying on my back in the middle of the living room floor.

I heard the lock turn, heard the front door open and close, but I didn't move or turn my head until Erek's amused face appeared above me. 

"What are you doing?"

"Sunbathing," I said, simply, like this was obvious. I was, in fact, stretched out in a patch of sunlight, like a cat soaking up a sunbeam. I lifted one arm and waved it at Erek until he got the point and stepped back, out of the way of the sunlight streaming through the front windows. 

"I guess I don't have to ask you how the Arctic was." I only groaned in response. "It must have been bad. You crank the air-conditioning up even in winter."

Well, yes, obviously. Southern California winters were a joke. I pushed myself up into a half-sitting position. "Did you talk to Marco?"

"Briefly, but not about much." His expression turned thoughtful as he considered me. I don't know what he saw, exactly, but he said, "Steph?"

"What?"

"Just checking." Erek tilted his head back to look up towards the ceiling. "Priton still upstairs, I guess?"

"Yep." 

Despite the cold and the danger, our little trip to the Arctic had been kind of like a vacation, or maybe a trial-run. With a pool at home, I could leave Priton behind while I went with the others to thwart the Yeerks' latest plan. It had turned out to be a very good idea, actually--it had taken us a full two days just to get home. It had been strange, but easier than the last time. At least now it made sense why Priton's absence felt so wrong. Not that we talked about it, or acknowledged it. 

We also didn't talk about the fact that he was still here at all. I didn't really want him to leave, and I don't think he was ready to go, either. I was afraid to ask why, honestly. Part of me was worried that if I asked, Priton would realize he had better things to do and it had just slipped his mind. He still hadn't tried to use the morphing cube, which was good in a weird way. If he had, I think I would have half-expected him to just leave one day without notice. Which was a silly thought, I know. He'd need a morph first, and he would need help with that. Still, it was the kind of thing that Priton would do, if at all possible.

"Want to tell me about your trip?" Erek asked. "I'll make hot chocolate." He held out a hand.

I accepted it, letting him pull me to my feet. "Sure." 

We'd started a routine, sort of on accident. After the David debacle--or almost debacle, I guess--it had felt so wrong not to tell _someone_. And so I'd ended up telling Erek. About David. About who he was, or who he would have been. About what Priton did and what it actually meant. And then later, I told him about our mission to save Bek, the young Hork-Bajir, and Erek laughed at me for being excited to meet Toby Hamee--and then laughed harder when I'd stuttered and told him I didn't want to say  _why,_ not because of spoilers, but because the reason was embarrassing and fangirl-y in a way that I probably should have been over by now. He'd listened, with surprised interest, when I told him about Elfangor and Loren and didn't bat an eye when I mentioned the Time Matrix.

"Tell the truth," I'd said. "That thing's on Earth 'cause of you guys, right?"

Erek had just smiled, and then asked a question about something else. I was taking that as a confirmation, but resolved to get the actual story at some point anyway.

 It wasn't entirely one-way, either. If you got him in the right mood, Erek had all kinds of stories. Priton only suffered through history when he wanted to make up for something, but Erek didn't seem to mind. There was something very novel about having a conversation with someone about something you had to hide most of the time.

"I can't decide what was worse," I said. "The cold, or listening to Marco and Ax's 'your minutes' schtick the whole time." We were in the kitchen now, and Erek had set a mug down in front of me. There wasn't a lot else, food-wise, in the kitchen at the moment. I was the only one who ate anything, anyway, and no one had been there since I had left with the others. There was actually a thin layer of dust starting to form on things, and it was a little weird, like coming home to someone else's house. Sometimes I wondered if living with the Chee was going to turn me into a clean freak later. Considering my bedroom was slowly turning into a disaster zone, probably not. 

Erek snorted. "That bad?"

"It was funny when it started." And would probably be funny again later. I liked that joke. It was the kind of dumb, pointless thing I looked forward to, like getting to relive fond memories. But I was also tired--from the mission, from the long trip home, from being around other people for so long without a mental break. 

Which is why, after Erek left me to my own devices, I stayed in the kitchen, sipping from my mug until my drink grew too lukewarm to be worth it. Then, I went upstairs to run the shower, and stayed under the hot spray until the bathroom became so warm and humid it was hard to breathe. It was only after I got out and got dressed again that I retrieved Priton--reassuringly and predictably grumpy about being left for so long, in that way that I could never quite be sure if he missed me at all or if he just missed having control. When I was feeling optimistic, I thought it might be both.

It was good to be home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I was ten, I started writing in a diary, and decided to name that diary after Toby Hamee. I don't remember why now, or why I decided a diary needed a name at all, but it would be the sort of thing teenage!me would be embarrassed about. Thirty-year-old me has no shame left, as proven by this fic's existence. Also, I've always thought that GB!Steph would be at least a little excited to meet various characters, it's just that previous to this, all the times she met someone who qualified, there were a lot of other, more stressful things to focus on.
> 
> The true fantasy of Going Back is that GB!Steph gets to ask people if her headcanons are true.


	2. Revenge

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: References to death and genocide, though nothing more than what's already in canon. Priton-typical levels of profanity.
> 
> Also I know just enough about cosmology to know I'm talking out of my ass in this.

_**Priton** _

Steph asked me once if I remembered dying. I told her I didn't remember anything between leaving her head and coming to again in the ocean. That's not exactly true. I can remember that terrifying minute of being blind and deaf to everything except my own anxiety, then a split second of pressure and almost-pain when she must have stepped down. And then nothing--or, more accurately, a momentary  _awareness_ of nothing and nowhere, and then the sudden, violent return of all sensation, like sticking your finger in a socket. I didn't tell Steph these things because she'd feel better thinking that it didn't hurt when she stepped on me, and hearing what I remembered of death would probably upset her. Still, as you might imagine, it's the kind of thing that sticks with you.

This was a lot like dying.

In our natural state, Yeerks don't have a lot of senses, it's true. We're mostly limited to touch and occasionally "seeing" through something like sonar. You might think being blind and deaf is the same wherever you are--lacking a light-sensing organ pretty much negates differences in the black void people think we must inhabit. And sure, there's only so much you can discern about the world around you. I'm not saying we're secretly capable of way more perception than other species think we are. But still. I felt the shift. One moment I was swimming circles in the portable Yeerk pool--a tiny, fractional version of something instinctual that was at once weirdly calming and distracting. And then, so suddenly it took no real time at all, nothing. A strange sensation like floating and then falling.

<Agggh!>

Lights! Sudden, cacophonous color and shape that my brain didn't have time to understand. Sounds! Air rushing past me. Voices that, on some level, I knew that I recognized, but couldn't make sense of. And then, a sensation I didn't know the name for. The sudden awareness of space and how my body filled it. My body, but also not _my_ body.

I realized too late that I had legs now. Too late to catch myself before they skidded out from under me and I landed, painfully, something rough and sharp jutting into the small of my back. 

I lay there, sprawled, trying to catch my breath, as the world came into proper focus. Someone asked if I was okay. No, no I was not okay. My vision, when I was finally able to make sense of it, was mostly obscured by a human, dressed in a brightly colored costume, frozen in place. When I pushed myself up and off the edge of the stage I'd managed to land on, I turned to see the others, looking as perplexed as I'd felt a moment ago. If I turned my head, I was sure I would see Ax and Tobias and an assortment of frozen  _Lion King_ actors.

You know what? Screw the script.

"Ellimist, you fucking bastard." My voice came out as almost a wheeze. Christ.

I thought I heard someone start to speak, but I didn't see who, as I was too busy scanning the rows of frozen students for one in particular. Right on cue, one of the frozen students stood up.

"Yes, it is I," the Ellimist said.

"I was  _feeding,_ asshole."

I might have just imagined it, but I swear to God he smiled. "My apologies, Priton."

 I just grunted in response. I crossed my arms over my chest.

"Where's the big voice and the quick-change bodies and all?" Rachel asked.

"I have chosen this form for a reason," the Ellimist said. "I come today on a humble mission. I wanted a humble form. One that would not evoke feelings of dread or awe or reverence from you."

<Right,> Steph said to me. She sounded as shaky as I felt. <Because none of this is dread- or awe-inspiring.>

The Ellimist stepped forward, through the rows of frozen students, down to where Tobias, Ax and I were by the stage. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a blur of blue as Ax moved, like he was ready for a fight. I realized, belatedly, that I was holding myself too tight. Jake shot us both a "take it easy" look. Ax relaxed. I didn't.

"Okay, so you're just a regular girl," Rachel said sarcastically. "No big show, aside from the fact that you froze time and all."

"This is as humble as I know how to be," the Ellimist said. "I come to-" he hesitated, "I come to tell you a story, and to see how you will choose to react."

"Oh, good, a story," Marco said. "Is it a musical, too? Will there be any hakuna matata involved?"

The Ellimist smiled. "I will tell you a story. You will tell me the ending." 

The Ellimist began his story--or at least, what I knew was the highly edited version of his story. It was hard to listen when you knew the parts he was leaving out. So, instead, I watched the others' expressions. The one's I could read anyway. They mostly seemed wary, which was fair. Afraid, even, which was smart. 

"A hundred million years ago, we fought, Crayak and I," the Ellimist said. 

And then, suddenly the auditorium was gone. We were in space, or not in space--a god's eye view of stars and planets and gas, blazing and dying out in the time it took to draw a breath. I saw--before my eyes? In my head? Does it matter?--images flash by of creatures of all shapes, sizes, colors. Giant mammals. Buzzing insects. Aquatic. Aerial. All blinking out, one by one. 

The view shifted as the Ellimist continued his story, and we could see what he saw. That n-dimensional space where I could see every angle at once, and the threads that I knew represented us--people, species, planets--that twisted and curled together and apart until staring at them made my head ache.

<AII Crayak's knowledge of space-time was now shattered. The few threads he had gathered to him were yanked from his grasp. Millions of years of effort wasted. We fell back, back from our test of wills, our war.>

Then we were back in normal space. Or relatively normal, I guess. Here, the Ellimist showed us images of the times he'd had a hand in our lives. His introduction. When Tobias saved Jara and Ket. Elfangor. And there, too, was his first meeting with Steph.

I didn't see myself. I didn't expect to. I still can't decide if it was good to have my own theory validated.

<Earth is part of our game, Crayak's and mine. He would have the Yeerks absorb humans and later be absorbed by some still more vicious species. But Earth is not the reason I have come to you now.>

And with that, we were back in the auditorium. I didn't realize until right then, when I could feel my legs trembling beneath me, that I was shaking.

"For millions of years we have played our game," the Ellimist said. "And we have lived within the rules, more or less. But now war threatens again. There is an impasse. A species I will not let Crayak take. A species he will not let me save. This species occupies a unique location in space-time. It is a turning point, and if Crayak can annihilate them, his power will grow, his goal become much closer, his forces become more deadly than ever."

"Including the Yeerks?" Jake asked.

"Yes, including the Yeerks, who will benefit from changes I cannot explain to humans - or even to mighty Andalites," he added with a smile at Ax. He didn't look at me. Probably because he knew that I'd know he was full of shit. The Iskoort weren't important. Not to us. Probably not to Crayak, either, even if he didn't seem to know it. The Iskoort were just a good means for what the Ellimist was really after--destruction of the Howlers. Destroy Crayak's creation like Crayak had destroyed the Ellimist's. I'd say it was nice revenge if I didn't think it was more like breaking another kid's toy because they wrecked yours.

"Crayak and I have agreed to decide the issue by a contest of champions. His against mine. He has named the Howlers themselves, a group of eight. I am to pit my eight champions against his."

"Eight," I repeated. 

The Ellimist smiled. "Do not worry, my Yeerk friend. Your... unique situation has been accounted for."

Yeah. I bet. I pursed my lips tightly together to stop myself from saying it out loud.

The Ellimist gave us a choice. But with the Ellimist a choice is never really a choice.

* * *

 I thought about waiting for Erek. We were going to the same place, after all. After reverting back home--less traumatizingly jarring than it had been to go the other way--I resumed swimming around the portable Yeerk pool, and Steph resumed watching the bad TV movie she'd been watching and neither of us were happy about it.

I hated being caught up in this mess. More than anything, I hated feeling like I had no control over my own life. I knew exactly how that would sound to anyone else, and I didn't care. I knew exactly where I'd be without the Ellimist and Crayak's meddling--still living my stolen life with my stolen family, trying to eke out my stolen happiness. I wouldn't have survived the war, I was positive of that--and I didn't care. 

Back in Steph's head, I skulked around the house for awhile before I couldn't wait anymore. We didn't need to wait for Erek. He'd know where to go. Or he could figure it out. It's not like we could leave without him.

We were the first to arrive at the barn. I flew in through the hayloft window, like old times, feeling a weird sense of deja vu. It's not like we hadn't been there since moving in with the Chee. We just hadn't really had a reason to hang out in the hayloft since then. Little had changed. There was a stack of plastic crates where we used to sleep. From the looks of things, you'd never know someone had lived up here for close to a year.

I sat at the edge, near the ladder, my legs dangling over the side. Then I thought better of it and pulled my legs up so I could cross them under me. I had visions of popping back to Earth when this was all over and falling and breaking my neck. That might have been paranoid, but that morning had left me feeling uneasy. I pulled my knees in close and waited for the others to show up.

Tobias was first, flying in through the open hayloft window as I had done, but landing to perch in his usual spot in the rafters. <Hey,> he greeted.

I nodded at him. "Hey. Where's Ax?"

<He should be here in a minute,> Tobias said.  He cocked his head to the side. <Are you okay? You look, uh, kind of tense.>

"Not really." There wasn't much reason to lie about it. "I don't like dealing with these guys."

<The Ellimist? Or Crayak?>

"Both."

<Oh.> He sounded mildly curious. <I don't remember--have you actually met the Ellimist before today? Priton, I mean. Obviously Steph has.>

"Nope," I said, crossing my arms. "But I  _know_ him. That's enough."

That seemed to be the end of our conversation, which was just as well. A minute later, Ax came wobbling through the barn doors on his freshly morphed human legs. We didn't have to wait so long before the others turned up, too.

As a general rule, we stayed out of most discussions, unless it seemed like we were steering in a direction we shouldn't. But that rarely happened. Steph's and my presence had altered some things--some very notable things--but we hadn't shaken the status quo so much that things didn't progress more or less as normal. I wasn't sure how we were supposed to feel about that.

"Iskoort?" Marco was saying. "Now it's our job to save Iskoort? What the . . . what is an Iskoort?" He looked at Ax, hands apart, questioning.

Ax shook his head. <I have never heard of the Iskoort.>

Marco looked up at us. I just shrugged noncommittally. 

When it came time to vote, it went as expected. We were being manipulated into causing a genocide--a genocide to avoid more genocide. There was something tragically funny about that--but we were going to do this anyway. Because we thought it would help us. Because we wanted revenge. Because this was the sort of thing we'd been unwittingly conscripted for. 

"Steph? Priton?" Jake asked when it came to us. Last as always.

"Go," I said, without hesitation.

"Unanimous," Marco said.

I shook my head. "No. One more. Ellimist said eight. I don't think he's counting me." I stared down at the empty space between the others. There was nothing remarkable or obvious about it. It was just open space. You could even see dust motes floating in the streak of sunlight coming into the barn. Still. He had to be there now.

"Go," came Erek's voice. And then there he was, standing almost exactly where I thought he would. I might have felt something like satisfaction about it if I couldn't also feel the rage coming off of Erek, even from where I was sitting. I knew Steph could feel it, too, because I could feel her uneasiness. Somehow it didn't seem like the appropriate moment for "I told you so."

"You know what this is all about?" Jakes asked Erek.

"I know what it's about," Erek said with a nod. "The Ellimist has brought me up to date. If you'll have me, I'll go. I want to go. I... I have to go."

"You can't fight," Rachel said bluntly. "No offense, but I'd rather go get Jara Hamee or one of the other free Hork-Bajir. We need firepower."

"Yes, but that won't be enough." Erek shook his head. "You won't defeat the Howlers in one-on-one combat. They are too deadly. You'll need more than your morphs. You'll have to outthink them. And I know them. I know the Howlers."

"I'd rather have someone with first-hand experience," I said. I felt Steph's surprise, and I saw Erek raise an eyebrow at me. I shrugged. "Especially one who can actually share what he knows." I doubt anyone could understand the full meaning behind that except Steph.

<You know, when I tell you that I think you could be nicer to Erek, this really isn't what I mean.>

<Beggars can't be choosers.>

Jake was looking up at me. "Are you going to be okay, Priton? Who knows how long this is going to take."

"I've thought about that," I said. I hesitated, then went on, "I don't think the Ellimist would send us someplace where we couldn't survive, biologically. That would just be putting himself at a disadvantage from the start."

HAVE YOU CHOSEN? a booming voice asked.

Jake sighed. "Yeah, but can you give us a few days to--"

And then the barn was gone, and we were standing upright, and we were face to vulture-like face with what had to be an Iskoort.

<Strangers! Strangers! Sell me your memories, strangers! Sell them to me, I beg of you.>

* * *

_**Steph** _

I remember that first night in Cassie's barn, when I decided to climb down from the hayloft to find something to acquire. I remember that absurd feeling of anxiety the first time I looked over side of the hayloft and saw the ten foot drop below me. That was one of those things that had gotten easier with Priton around. Maybe Yeerks don't have an instinctual fear of heights since they're naturally aquatic--or whatever you'd call them, I guess. Maybe it was just that we so rarely entered or exited the barn as a human. I don't know.

At any rate, the drop off the edge of the walkway we were standing on made the hayloft look like an anthill.

 The Iskoort home word was a lot like I expected--brightly colored pathways, giant, skyscraper sized support pillars, all miles up off the ground. And of course the Iskoort themselves--with their vulture-like heads and their wheezing accordion bodies.

<That wheezing's going to get annoying fast,> Priton mused.

<Your people.>

<I think this is the equivalent of meeting your long lost cousins and finding out they're all hillbillies.>

<Hey now,> I said. <Remember, my grandparents grew up in a tiny mountain village. And anyway,> I added, <if anything, you're probably the hillbilly cousin in this scenario.>

<It's all a matter of perspective I guess?>

<Everybody's a _vlaka_ to somebody.>

Priton snorted at that, a surprised sound that made the others turn and look at us. Except Erek, who didn't even look up, and Rachel, whose hair Erek was busy cutting to pay for Guide's help.

Still. " _What_?" Rachel asked testily.

"Nothing. Never mind." Priton gave her a thumbs up she couldn't see, since her back was turned. "You look great."

"Ignore them," Erek said, sounding like a beleaguered parent. He took a step back. "There, I think you're done."

* * *

Sometimes I wish there was a do-over button. Sometimes I think we got so used to going with the flow, and not interfering except when it was really necessary, that we let little things slip through the cracks. Like how in retrospect, we could have stopped Erek from taking in the Howlers' memories. We didn't need them. We could have told the others what we knew instead. Or we could have tried, anyway. 

<It's weird that you want to protect a guy who's five thousand years old.>

<Only when you say it like that,> I said, snippier than I'd really intended. This was an old fight. <I want to protect my _friend_.>

We were in the apartment Guide had found us for our first night. Priton had volunteered for first watch, since he didn't need to sleep any time soon anyway, and I didn't think I'd be able to sleep. I don't think any of us really slept. 

Still, Priton drifted towards Erek as the others either slept or pretended to sleep. Erek gave us a suspicious side eye as Priton approached, clasping my hands behind my back and projecting an air of casual calm that was so laughably out of place I don't know why he even bothered. 

"What do you want, Priton?" Erek asked, sounding inexplicably tired. I couldn't tell if it was because of the situation or just Priton. It might have been both.

"I was just thinking," Priton said, our voice low so the others wouldn't hear. "That you must have a lot of insight into the Howlers now."

"More than I would like, yes," Erek said. "What about it?"

"It doesn't bother you? That they're basically children?"

"They killed my creators," Erek said, as if this ended the subject. "What do you think?"

Priton rocked back and forth on my heels. "I'd think that would at least complicate things, if nothing else."

Erek snorted derisively. "Does it, though? You know what they're like, clearly--do  _you_ feel sympathy for them?" 

Priton didn't say anything. The answer was no. I could feel it in that strange way we sometimes bled into each other. There was no real point to this conversation except to needle Erek, which was, let's face it, needlessly cruel. 

<You could tell the others if it bothers you so much,> I told him. 

<It doesn't bother _you_?>

It did. We were all just pawns in the Ellimist and Crayak's game, or whatever the appropriate chess metaphor here was. The Howlers' part in this wasn't really their fault. But it also didn't bother me, too. Genocide couldn't be excused, and it couldn't be allowed to go on. We were being used for the Ellimist's agenda, which I hated, and knew Priton hated. But it was an agenda I didn't disagree with in this case. 

It could be both things.

Priton moved away from Erek, not bothering to feign subtlety this time. There wasn't really a point.

* * *

  _ **Priton**_

<That is definitely a Yeerk pool.>

Say what you want about the Iskoort, but they were awfully accommodating. Granted, we'd promised to make Guide unfathomably wealthy with our memories, but still. _I'd_ have a hard time showing off _my_ food source to an alien I hardly knew. 

It was like a bizarre-o version of home. I'd hitched a ride on Guide as a fly, and he'd taken us down a couple levels to the "Yoort" pool where he intended to feed. We were in one of the Iskoort's colorful igloo-like structures. There were Iskoort milling around, and a familiar-enough scene of creatures bending over the central pool, either depositing or receiving. It was all very orderly. Calm. Or as calm as Iskoort got, I suppose. I might have been at a Taco Bell on Earth for as undramatic as it was. Actually, I'd seen Taco Bells with _much_ more drama. 

The pool itself was raised--either because there wasn't room to build it into the floor or to put it at a more comfortable height for the Iskoort, I don't know. It reminded me, rather uncomfortably, of the Yeerk pool at the Sharing's headquarters. I hadn't spent much time _in_ it--just the relatively brief period between learning I was getting my first host assignment and infesting Ben--but I'd spent quite a lot of time  _around_ it. At least this one didn't have restraints. I'd never seen a Yeerk pool without them, even my own personal one, or without guards. 

I turned away from the pool to look at Guide. "If I can ask, where do you guys keep your power supply?" There wasn't a kandrona inside the building, at least as far as I could tell. Not that that meant much, of course. 

Guide whined in what I thought might be confusion. <I do not understand.>

"Your kandrona," I said, waving a hand as if to indicate the room around us. "I haven't seen anything resembling one since we've been here."

<Are you referring to an artificial kandrona?> I nodded. <Many generations ago, when we conquered other species, we built artificial kandronas to nourish us on the planets we claimed,> Guide informed me. <But it is no longer necessary.>

"Not necessary?" I repeated, feeling suddenly like I was speaking a foreign language.

<Yes. Our sun is a K-class star, and produces sufficient kandrona rays that we do not need artificial supplementation.>

I blinked. "Oh," was all I could think to say to that. I felt like an idiot, because it had truly not occurred to me until now that this was a possibility. Which, in retrospect, was very, very stupid. Like someone who just learned that their home planet wasn't the center of the universe, it never occurred to me that there were other suns out there that produced kandrona rays. 

Of course, I'd never been on my own home planet, or seen its sun. I didn't even know if there was Yeerkish information on the subject, since we'd gone straight from the stone age to a space-faring diaspora. Maybe Andalites knew more. Maybe I could ask Ax. But I was pretty sure there would be nothing more galling than asking an Andalite--even Ax--for information on the Yeerk home world. 

Well, if nothing else, I had what I'd really come there for. Part of it was wanting to deal the blow to Crayak, sure, but that was going to happen anyway. I doubted I'd done anything significant besides pick a stupid, pointless fight with Erek--he was right. And I was being childish--but it was hard not to be curious about the Iskoort. I swung between thinking they _had_ to be Yeerks, or at least closely related, like neanderthals and humans, or something to that effect. Looking at the Iskoort world, I could see how my own people would create something like it. All those brilliant colors. It looked like the construction of some giant. lego-loving child--or of a species who'd gained the wonder of sight and would do anything to keep it. 

But then Guide had a parent he could know. One sibling. That wasn't possible for Yeerks. I might not know a lot--I didn't even know what kind of star my home world revolved around--but I at least knew _that_.

<Maybe it's part of their whole genetic engineering thing,> Steph offered. <Like, they're all test tube ba--uh, grubs.>

<Maybe. Not inconceivable.>To Guide, I asked, "Would it be all right if I left my  host to feed in the pool? This set up is... very similar to mine." I wasn't actually hungry, but I was also a bit fuzzy on when we would be going home.

Guide whined in the affirmative, and at least there was a little relief to take the edge off things.

* * *

  _ **Steph**_

When we got home at last, Priton trudged up the stairs toward our room. My legs felt like jelly and I was tired like I hadn't slept since we left. We were home, we were alive, we'd emerged victorious. We hadn't actually helped ourselves at all, but we'd saved the Iskoort anyway. Maybe Priton thought it was worth it. I don't know, I didn't ask him.

Priton paused in the upstairs hallway, outside "his" room--the one where we stored his portable Yeerk pool. I wasn't privy to his thoughts, but I could feel his weariness, and I thought, maybe, he wanted to be alone.

He must have known I thought that, and he didn't contradict me, so I said, <Go. I want to talk to Erek anyway.>

A few minutes later, I found Erek sitting in front of the television. The news was on, but he muted it when he saw me.

I shifted from one foot to the other, absurdly uneasy. It was only Erek, for God's sake. Finally I asked, "Are you okay?"

"Not really." Erek shrugged. He was peering at me curiously. "Are _you_ angry with me?"

"No. It's not like I haven't known what was going to happen this whole time." And neither Priton nor I had said anything either. 

"True, I guess." A beat. "Do you want to watch TV with me?"

"Sure."

We watched the news. There'd been some big warehouse fire downtown while we were gone that was being covered. It was so mundane, such a normal piece of bad news, it was almost comforting. After awhile, we changed the channel. _Friends_ was on. 

At some point, I'd pulled my legs up and folded them on the couch, leaning against Erek's shoulder. If he particularly noticed, he didn't seem to mind, and I was comfortable, anyway.

The episode was ending when I said, "Erek? Can I ask you a question?"

"Sure."

"Why didn't you tell the others about Priton? At the beginning."

I felt him shift to look at me, but I was still staring straight ahead at the TV. "You're asking now?"

I shrugged. I could have asked before. I probably should have asked before. But the longer I went without asking, the stranger it would be to bring it up. And anyway, we were already on the topic of Erek's morally ambiguous actions that day. Why not bring up old ones?

"You're not going to like my answer," Erek warned.

"I know. Tell me anyway."

Erek sighed. "I was curious to see what a Yeerk fighting for our side would do. He was right--if he was going to give you away, he would have done it before I met him. And... you seemed okay. After that first time. I was more curious than concerned." He sounded embarrassed.

"Controllers are acceptable losses," I said. It was a terrible thought, and I didn't want to actually believe that. But it's not like we didn't often act like that was the case, even if we said we thought otherwise.

I thought Erek would contradict me, but he didn't. Maybe he knew it would sound like a lie. "I'm sorry," he said instead.

"Thank you." We were quiet for a long time. Finally, I held up my hand. "Can I have the remote?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I might be a troll. Also it's weird that _this_ is the longest chapter I've ever posted to ao3. If all the chapters of this part were this long, I would have just cut it up into multiple parts. I only regret doing this book in one shot a little bit. 
> 
> It's weird to think that #26 is the first time Priton and the Ellimist meet face to face. Weird that it's only the second time GB!Steph has met him. Also, my opinion of the Ellimist in general has definitely degraded over the last twenty years, though for added chicken-or-the-egg weirdness, it's probably gotten worse since I've been writing this iteration of Going Back. The same thing is happening with my opinion of Andalites, I think--the dangers of spending too much time in Priton's head. Ax is fine, he relates to Elfangor an uncomfortable amount, and that's about it.
> 
> "Vlaka" apparently means "idiot" in Greek, but I think when I learned it--and how GB!Steph would understand it--it was always used to mean something more like "stupid peasant." Regardless, it's a pretty rude thing to call someone, kind of like "hillbilly."


	3. The Longest Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter includes (non-sexual) male nudity.

_**Priton** _

"Priton? Steph? Is that you?"

I had been coming down the stairs, so I paused, midstep. "Yeah, Mr. King. It's us."

"Could you come here for a moment? I'm in the family room."

 I hopped down the last few stairs, then made my way toward the sound of Mr. King's voice. As I rounded the corner, I saw him, sitting on the couch, churro in hand, television on--the TV was _always_ on--and his familiar hologram flickering in and out. Human. Android. Human. Android. 

Oh.

 "I seem to be malfunctioning," Mr. King said. I might have laughed if his hologram expression that kept flashing in and out didn't look very, very scared.

"Uh, yeah." I didn't really know what else to say. There was never a good thing to say in these situations. "It's going to be okay" sounds false, or like a meaningless platitude--so much so that I wasn't even sure we were allowed to say it. It was so meaningless it wasn't worth the frustration. Instead, I crossed the room to the windows behind where Mr. King was sitting on the couch.

"You're not surprised," Mr. King surmised with a sigh as I drew the blinds behind him. "I suppose that's reassuring. You know what needs to be done." I made a noncommittal sound. "Or what shouldn't be done, maybe?" When I didn't have anything useful to say to _that_ , Mr. King said, "Would you get the television remote for me? I was changing the channel when I started seizing up."

"Sure, Mr. King."

I found the remote on the floor by his feet and flopped down into a chair to channel surf until Mr. King told me I could stop. He said he wanted to watch the news. It was too early for that, but there was a sitcom rerun on that he liked and that we hadn't seen so we settled in to wait.

After awhile, Mr. King suggested, "Perhaps you should call your friends?"

"No need." Really, I was surprised no one had called _us_. Maybe Rachel thought Jake and Marco would be more helpful. Since I didn't have a morph that could carry a Chee, I was going to say she made the right choice.

"Ah. I see." 

"Can't be that long," I said, trying to sound reassuring. At this point, Mr. King had stopped flickering all together. He was just his strange, canine-like android self now. He could have been a statue, if it weren't for the voice emanating from... somewhere. I wasn't actually sure how that worked. It seemed like a weirdly personal question, and the only Chee I knew that well were Erek--that wasn't happening--or Mr. King, and like I said. Weird to ask someone how their body worked. At least when their body wasn't also an extension of your own most of the time.

Still, there was  _one_ thing I was curious about. I leaned forward. "While we're waiting, Mr. King, I'm dying to know something."

"Yes?"

"What's with the churro?"

* * *

 "...So, I guess we just need to know how to get into the Pemalite ship," Jake was saying.

We were home again, briefly, after saving Lourdes. Jake had come with us to talk to the Chee--to debrief, and to figure out what we were doing next. We were only half way through this interminably long day and we were already battle-worn and exhausted. Stopping wasn't an option.

Steph was surprised that I was actually trying. I thought I might be offended if I wasn't so tired. The Chee were our allies. They'd kept me safe and alive when they really didn't have to. And anyway, it's not like I enjoyed other people's suffering. I was an asshole, not a sadist.

"Steph knows the passcode to get onto the ship," Erek said. Without his hologram, I couldn't read his expression, but I thought he wasn't very happy with us all the same.

Jake looked at us. I nodded. "Yeah, we can get in."

Shortly after that, Jake left. I walked him out, then came back to the family room where the two frozen Chee were sitting in front of the television. I considered them for a moment. "You know there was no way we could've warned you this was coming," I finally said.

I was talking mostly to Erek and we all knew it, but it was Mr. King who answered. "We know. We are not angry with you. Either of you."

"We're not mad," Erek agreed, somewhat less convincingly.

"Uh-huh. Well, I guess if you need anything while I'm here, just holler."

I spent the next while puttering around the kitchen. Heated up some leftover pizza. Contemplated using the internet to look up information on giant squids. It probably wasn't good that all of our knowledge came from a children's sci-fi series. With all due respect, I don't think the authors were zoology experts. Steph was still confused by the fact that quadruped knees aren't backwards. 

I gave up on the research idea quick enough. There wasn't a lot of time anyway. So instead I sat down with Erek and Mr. King to watch the news, and wait for some good old fashioned divine intervention.

* * *

 Yeerk sleep is kind of weird. We sleep less than humans, for starters, needing a rest about as often as we need to feed, assuming we wait the full three days. A Yeerk day is longer than an Earth day, but shorter than an Andalite one. I slept more than Ax did, at any rate. 

Still, even then, it's more of a half-sleep. It doesn't take very much to rouse us. Environmental changes, host distress, what have you. We can be alert  _enough_ in very little time, which is good when you're immediately having to operate a whole other body, about a thousand times your actual size.

I didn't feel the shift. Maybe it was too subtle for even a sleeping Yeerk to notice. Maybe you only get that specific feeling of floating and then falling when the Ellimist is pulling you through dimensional space. Either way, when I came to, I knew without opening my eyes that something was not right. I was lying on my back on something cold and hard. I don't usually sleep on my back--Steph complains that it's impossible to fall asleep that way, so to make her happy I usually opted for my side or stomach. That alone wasn't especially disturbing. No, there was something else, something much more terrifying, that I could tell without opening my eyes, inside my own head.

I was very, very alone.

It's impossible to avoid a host's mind. Even if you try to ignore them. Even if they don't "speak" to you, consciously or otherwise. It's there, surrounding you, always, as integrated into your own being as your own mind is. A well-known host's mind feels like home--warm, inviting, familiar, even when the person it belongs to hates you. It's security and comfort and that knowledge that you're not wandering through this universe alone. It's a microcosm of a Yeerk's natural environment--the smaller, more intimate cousin to Pool culture. There's nothing inherently evil about infestation--in its purest form, it's something beautiful. But that's never how it plays out, even when you mean well. That second, ever-present mind can't be a true partner when the power imbalance is so great.

There was no second mind inside my head with me.

I jackknifed into a sitting position, sitting up so fast my head spun. I caught a glimpse of metal and colored lights as my eyes adjusted, before my gaze was drawn down at myself. There was the familiar human shape--the torso. The arms. The legs. I stretched too long fingers, flexed unfamiliar feet. I wasn't wearing clothes--not the clothes I'd gone to bed in, not a morphing outfit, nothing to hide the obvious fact. This wasn't Steph's body. It was missing some key components, for one thing. Some others had been added, for another.

"Okay," I said. My voice sounded odd in its familiarity, like hearing a recording of yourself for the first time. "Okay, you've got my attention."

"Isn't this what you want, Priton the Traitor?" I looked up, and there was the Drode, as if he'd appeared out of thin air. Maybe he did. I hadn't exactly been paying attention. 

We were on a ship's bridge. That much was obvious, though it didn't look particularly like any ship I knew. Not that I had a great deal of experience. My experience on spacecraft was limited to a very short view of the pool ship through the ancient, half-blind Gedd used for training, and a spin in a bug fighter that precluded a jungle adventure I couldn't remember. 

"Is that my moniker?" I asked, pushing myself up to stand. "I don't think I like it. Not very creative. And not true. Treason requires loyalty." I spread my hands, as if presenting something. "In case you haven't heard, I'm only interested in keeping myself alive."

The Drode might have smiled. It was kind of hard to tell--every expression on that prune face looked grotesque to me. "Oh,  _yes._ The Yeerk who fights alongside humans and Andalites, who loved his humans _so_ much, he fights a war for them. You certainly have no loyalties!" The Drode laughed, mocking. "You, who betrayed your own species. Selfish! Impulsive! A dirty alien lover. Can a selfish, impulsive traitor resist betraying his beloved aliens? I don't think so!"

"What is this about, Drode?" Frankly, I'd already had more than enough of this. "You here to try and lure me to the 'dark side,' too? Kind of late in the game for that kind of offer, don't you think?"

"Not an offer! A warning!" The Drode moved closer. I resisted the urge to back away. "The Ellimist wants your human to change this timeline."

"What _does_  he expect her to do exactly?" I asked. "That's never been very clear."

The Drode ignored me. "My master Crayak, in his great wisdom--"

"Oh for _fuck's sake_."

The Drode stopped talking, and instead leaned in close, so close I could smell his surprisingly foul breath. I couldn't help it--I flinched. " _Stop her_."

"Why would I want to do that?" 

Thankfully, the Drode moved back slightly. He was still grinning that unsettlingly grotesque smile. "There will be consequences if you don't. Terrible consequences! Worse if you aid her. I do not think you will like your consequences."

Something in the way he said it--so simple, so straight forward--made me more uneasy than being dragged back and forth across space. A sense of foreboding that wasn't going to leave me for a very long time. "I see," I said. 

It was a vague threat. But a vague threat was a lot more effective than a vague bribe. 

"Well," I said, taking a step back, as if making for an exit that wasn't there. "Tell your master that I'll take his... 'offer' into consideration."

"Do that." My vision was starting to go blurry around the edges. "Goodbye for now, Priton the Traitor."

And then, without any real fanfare, I was back. Back in my bed. Back in the Kings' spare bedroom that we called home now. And there, too, was the sudden jarring, but reassuringly familiar presence of another mind beneath and around my own. There was the perfectly imperfect connection between my mind and the body I inhabited, that feeling that said  _this isn't really yours._ It's a temporary residence, and no matter how perfectly I fit into the crevices of this body's brain, how keenly I felt its consciousness, I was only a visitor, there by the will of fate and gods and Steph herself. 

I already missed having a body and mind to myself, one that was just mine. I felt it as a physical ache. And I wondered, too, if I would feel that same ache for the facsimile I was living now, if and when I ever got what I wanted.

<P?> Steph's "voice" was worn and groggy, wavering on that precipice between sleep and wakefulness. <'S wrong?>

<Bad dream,> I told her. <Go back to sleep. Everything's fine.> I rolled over onto our stomach, hugging the pillow to us, as if to encourage this.

<'Kay.>  _Didn't know they dreamed_ was the last conscious thought I heard before she was asleep again, and that odd paralysis of a sleeping host overtook us again.

We don't.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Number of Time I've Rewritten This Chapter: 3. At this point, I'm just happy it's not random keyboard mashing. 
> 
> It feels very in keeping with Animorphs to have a "what the hell even was that" moment. 
> 
> On a lighter note, fun fact: I always read the Drode's voice as the crypt keeper from Tales from the Crypt. We're going to assume that's not what he actually sounds like here, because I don't know about you, but I can't take him seriously like that.
> 
> Next chapter is much lighter fare. Don't worry. We'll be back with more actual plot stuff after _These Messages._


	4. Children

_**Priton** _

"Ax-man? You home?"

I was crouched at the entrance of Ax's scoop. It was fairly well-hidden--I wouldn't have known it was there if I didn't know where to find it, not until I was almost on top of it. I was holding a small clay pot in my hands. I'd already forgotten the name of the plant inside it. 

 <Priton? Steph? Is something wrong?>

"Uh, no." I shifted uneasily, trying to keep a better grip on the pot in my hands. "Steph really wanted to see your new digs. Can we come in?"

There was a moment too long pause, then, <Yes, of course.>

It was a short drop into the scoop from the entrance. I landed with less grace than I would have liked, but not as embarrassingly as I could have, so I'd call that a win. Ax was standing at the makeshift computer terminal he'd built. It was still a work in progress--I could see a mass of tangled wires tucked just out of the way, like they'd been hastily moved out of the open because company had arrived.

"We brought you a house-warming present," I said, holding out the plant I was still holding. "It's technically from us  _and_ Mr. King, since he helped pick it out."

<Thank you,> Ax said, taking the pot from me. His head tilted a little to the side, in a weirdly human gesture of curiosity. <Does it emit heat?>

"Huh? Oh. Umm, no." I shifted from one foot to the other. "It's a human tradition. When someone moves into a new residence, it's traditional to bring them a gift. Usually something practical, or something to decorate the place with. To make it feel... warmer. More homey."

<Ah. I see.> Ax set the pot down on his work station.

Probably unsurprisingly, we didn't spend much of our free time with Ax. I guess technically we didn't spend our free time with anyone specific, besides each other--obviously--and the Chee. That was probably at least half my fault. Regardless, with Ax at least, it was kind of hard to get around the fact that he was an Andalite and I was a Yeerk, and even though we saved each other's butts on the regular, we still looked an awful lot like each other's sworn enemy.

Or maybe my winning personality intimidated him. Who can say?

The scoop wasn't very big, but there was room enough to move around. A place for Ax's computer, a place for his television, an open-ish area where I assumed Ax could... lounge or stand or whatever it was Andalites did when they were relaxing at home. 

<Isn't it weird that a claustrophobic species like Andalites lives underground?> Steph wondered. 

<I don't know, ask him sometime.>

< _You_ ask him.>

I stepped around the television, peering behind it at the hodge-podge configuration that that I imagined had to be powering it. It looked like a somewhat more organized pile of wires than the one by the computer. To be fair, I wasn't much of a tech person. I'd once struggled to set up Ben's new VCR. According to Steph, I was the worst alien she'd ever heard of.

"How'd you get cable in here, by the way? Like, you've obviously modified the technology here." I looked up at Ax, who'd come to join me at the TV. "I'm kind of impressed." I genuinely was, too. Ax reminded me frequently of kids I used to teach who were actually very smart when it came to certain things, but never put in the same effort into their classes. They drove Ben crazy. Ax also sometimes struck me as the Andalite version of Marco--at least as far as this sort of thing was concerned. His ability to reverse engineer alien technology also reminded me of my own people, but that was probably a thing better kept to myself.

Ax's ear perked up. <Really?> He sounded surprised, and I wondered if I'd ever actually complimented him before. Probably not. Weird. <Well, it was somewhat simple, once I collected the necessary materials--> 

He launched into a several minute explanation, which, frankly, I didn't understand most of. Like I said--I'm not really a tech guy. I mostly understood how to use what other people had already built. Still, I nodded along anyway, like it all made perfect sense to me.

Ax concluded his spiel with a sigh, <Of course, it is not as much as could be done with better resources. I am only working primitive human technology--there is only so much I can do. If I had access to more sensible tools, I might have done more.>

"Yeah, sure," I said, mostly because this was the sort of thing I expected him to say. Ax, like just about every Andalite in existence, couldn't talk about alien technologies without pointing out that it was inferior. Though with Ax, I was never quite sure how much of that was Andalite superiority, and how much of it was him being a homesick kid, far, far away from his own people. I could cut a lot of slack for the latter. Homesickness I can understand. Still, I couldn't quite help saying, "Nothing compares to good ol' Andalite know-how."

Ax was looking down at the TV screen--we'd turned it on in the course of his explanation--but he swiveled one stalk eye to look at me. Maybe he sensed my sarcasm.

<P,> Steph said, her tone like a warning.  _Be nice._

"Ax, I know it's like a nervous tic for Andalites to remind everyone of their superiority--"

< _Priton. >_

"--but come on." I gestured down at the television, at the assorted array of pulled-apart bits of Radio Shack paraphernalia and who knows what else. "You've gotta remember. Humans, they've just barely started dipping their toes in the cosmic pool. Free humans didn't even have concrete evidence of planets outside this system until a couple years ago. They've only just started. They're  _children."_ Ax was looking at me now with his main eyes, his stalk eyes returning to their usual constant twisting look-out. "Don't disparage them, they're still growing. And learning."

Ax seemed to consider this. <They are children who grow and learn very fast,> he noted.

I felt my lips twitch into a half-smile. "The scariest kind."

<Yes.> Somehow, it didn't feel like we were just talking about humans. <Do they really frighten you?>

"Me?" I shrugged. "No. Not really. They fascinate me." It was a strange thing to tell Ax, as I didn't generally say such things to anyone. But maybe as my fellow alien in all of this, Ax would understand.

Ax nodded. <Would you like to watch  _The Young and the Restless?_   It will be starting soon.>

"Yeah, sure. Why not?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Somewhere in my notes for Going Back is something like "if [Ax and Priton] are the best we can hope for as far as Yeerk-Andalite relations goes, no wonder said relations are shit." I mean, it could be way worse than just "Kinda Awkward."
> 
> A google search tells me that the first exoplanet was discovered on October 6, 1995, about three and a half years before #28 was published.
> 
> I don't know why, but the image of Priton, an alien from a space-faring species, being the series' Mildly Befuddled By Technology Grandpa is the funniest thing to me.


	5. Aftran

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Age Logic: By my Somewhat Arbitrary Reasoning, during #29 I put the Animorphs around 14/15, which would put them around freshman in high school.
> 
> All Yeerk communication headcanons are brought to you by the fact that 10 year old me read the line in this book where Cassie says Aftran can't hear her thought speech and went "That's dumb I don't like it." I have similar feelings on how Gleet Biofilters work, but kind of completely bypass that here for Reasons.

_**Priton** _

We didn't go to the dance.

We're not really "dance" people. That was what I told the others. Steph had never had much interest in them, and that many people in one room with that much noise made her feel claustrophobic, anyway. To me, dances were an unexciting human ritual that I was fine with skipping--though in another life, I'd somehow always gotten corralled into chaperoning at least one a year. 

I told Steph I really didn't want to go because I didn't want to have to deal face-to-face with Illim. I trusted the Yeerk Peace Movement in general, and Illim and Tidwell specifically, but there was something deeply unsettling about the idea of going to a place where someone--or multiple someones--knew my name, my host, and my politics. 

Technically, both those excuses were true.

The others had started high school. And while on the one hand, there was every possibility that Ben wouldn't be there, there was every possibility that he might be, too. I couldn't decide which would be worse. I _wanted_ to see him, wanted to see for myself that he was all right and happy and that my presence hadn't completely fucked up his life. I also didn't want to see him, for all the same reasons. I think going and finding he wasn't there would be even worse.

I kept that last one to myself. The others didn't know much of what I'd been doing in the war before I infested Steph, and I wanted to keep it that way. And there were some things Steph and I just didn't talk about. Because I didn't like talking about that sort of thing. And because it made her feel insecure--unnecessarily, but I didn't want to talk about that either. Sometimes it pays to have a selectively obtuse host. If she were less obtuse I could probably get away with less.

It's all kind of funny when you think about it. Steph was from another universe. I was a Yeerk fighting against my own people. And yet we were fighting objectively the most boring of wars. It was a lot of sitting and waiting. Not that I was really complaining. I didn't really envy the others in their efforts to juggle the war, school and family. In a twisted kind of way, I'd already done that, anyway.

So we stayed home. We waited. I only regretted it a little bit. And when the phone rang later in the evening, we let Erek pick it up. I came down the stairs as he was talking to someone on the other end, sat down on the steps and folded my arms over my knees as I waited for him to finish. From where I was sitting, I could see Erek in the kitchen, the wireless phone pressed to his ear, and he could see me.

"We'll be right there," Erek said into the phone before hanging up.

I stood up as Erek turned towards us. "Ax?"

"I guess so." Erek shook his head. "You know it never stops being creepy how you do that." 

I almost smiled. "And you know it'd be worse if there was something we _didn't_ know." I turned to head back up the stairs. "See you at Cassie's."

* * *

 <You're being rude.>

<That's fine,> I said. I was leaning against one of the barn's wooden pillars, as far away from Ax--and from Jake, who was looking progressively less steady--as I could get without leaving the barn entirely. <You might want the authentic _Animorphs_ experience, but I'd rather not get the Andalite flu, thanks.>

<That's not what I mean and you know it.>

I shrugged. It was neither here nor there. I suppose on some morbid level I was a little curious on if  _Yamphut_ could affect me. I wasn't really clear on how it affected humans--or why it was the only disease we'd come across that was communicable across species. Humans are lousy with weird diseases, it's basically the most defining characteristic of their history--but I'd also never personally been sick ever. I'd experienced plenty of second-hand sickness through my hosts, but so far at least, that was the extent of it. Really, the person who should have been worried was Steph. Looking out for my host's health and well-being was, as always, a completely thankless job.

We were gathered in the barn. We'd arrived as the others were debating what to do about Tidwell and Aftran--a conversation I'd put to bed pretty easily. Yes, we could trust Tidwell. Yes we could trust the Yeerk Peace Movement--though maybe just the two members we actually knew for now. That really just left the question of how to get down to the Yeerk Pool.

"The Yeerks have probably figured out how we got in last time," Rachel said. "We need a new way in if we don't want to get ambushed."

"Priton? Any ideas?" Jake asked.

As a matter of fact, yes. "I know a foolproof way to get down there," I said. "But I don't think you're going to like it."

"Do we have another choice?"

"Not a good one, no." I pushed off the pillar I was leaning against, taking a step forward. "The surest way to get down to the Yeerk Pool is as a Yeerk. Or a Yeerk in a host--" The others recoiled visibly at that. I pretended not to notice. "But probably the easiest  would be for you guys to morph me and I could carry you."

Nobody liked that idea. Part of it was probably the aversion to morphing another sentient creature. Probably. But let's be honest--that definitely wasn't most of it.

I got it. I did. But sometimes it got a little hard to not feel mildly insulted.

It took a little convincing. Then I sent Cassie into the house to find tupperware or sandwich bags or something that could be filled with water and trusted to hold a Yeerk. Then, when everyone was ready, I crawled out of Steph's ear and they passed me around like a hot potato. Steph told me later that it was incredibly weird. It wasn't much of anything for me, just blackness and pressure, the disconcerting feeling of immobility. 

We didn't end up trying to infiltrate the Yeerk Pool that night. Now, I won't say that I was trying to distract them--morphing Yeerk  _was_ the best way to get past the Gleet Biofilters, and most of them were never going to have another opportunity--but I won't deny that it was a definite added bonus.

* * *

I woke up to a pitch dark bedroom, a nauseous stomach, something warm and furry pressed against my face, and the telltale signs of early hunger pangs.

So much for avoiding sickness, I guess.

<Steph?> I felt her mind stirring around my own. <Steph, come on, I have to feed.>

I wasn't sure how long we'd been out for. The last... while was a confusing blur of puke and delirium. I was the supposedly unaffected one, and I still had a hard time remembering more than snippets. Mr. King force-feeding us chicken noodle soup that we didn't keep down. Water that we didn't keep down. I didn't know what day it was. I didn't know when we'd gone to sleep, and even trying to recall a time _before_ we felt like death warmed over made my head pound. 

As Steph roused and I regained mobility, I pushed myself up, pausing to close my eyes against the wave of dizziness and nausea that came with moving even that much. When I opened my eyes again, the room was still too dark to see, and as I reached my hand out to find the edge of the bed, I remembered that there was another barrier to getting up. 

During one of our more lucid moments--I could remember that there were those, just not when they happened--Mr. King asked if we'd like one of the dogs from down in the park, for company. Humans often find a lot of comfort in animals. I'm pretty sure humans are so geared toward socialization that they'll pack bond with anything. Earth animals. Robots. Parasitic aliens. You get the idea. 

If it had been just me, I would have said no.

<You're supposed to be a cat person,> I teased. I'd relinquished control--it felt like the right thing to do in this situation, even as warped as my sense of "right" probably was most of the time--and our arm was draped over a mutt as we lay curled up in bed.

<I can like both.> Our arm tightened slightly, then loosened again and Steph gave the dog a pat, subconciously worried about being too rough, though the object of her worry didn't seem to notice. <I'm going to call him Muffin.>

<Oh, God, don't name it. If you name it, you're going to want to keep it.> And we couldn't have a pet. I'm sure it'd always have a home with the Chee, but Steph would feel bad about it when she eventually went home. 

The fact that the dog was still on our bed at the moment said I probably lost that argument for the time being.

"Off," I said to the dog, giving it a weak shove. He only made a grunting noise in response. I'm not even sure I woke him up. Great.

By the time I managed to scoot my way off the end of the bed, we were a little more awake. It wasn't actually as dark as I originally thought when I first awoke, making it easier get around Muffin-- _sigh--_ and to our bedroom door, even on perilously shaky legs.

<Where are we going?> Steph asked. She "sounded" half-asleep still, even as she was conscious enough to let me move around.

<I need to feed,> I reminded her. I opened our door, stared out into the dark hallway, contemplating the distance and how unsteady our body felt as I held it upright, and then called, "Mr. King?"

I heard his door open, and then the reassuring, familiar faux-human shape of Mr. King seemed to materialize beside us. "What do you need?"

"I'm going to feed," I said. I let go of the doorknob, which I'd been gripping tightly without really realizing it. "Steph's going to need help getting back to bed." And I probably needed help getting to the pool. I didn't say so, but Mr. King seemed to understand anyway, because he took our arm and I let him steady us.

We made it down the hall and into the room where we kept the portable Yeerk pool without incident. It wasn't until I was kneeling down that I felt the welling surge of delirious panic.

<Don't leave me!>

It was only because we--she--had a fever. It was only because it felt like an especially fragile time. Steph would have never said it--never consciously thought it--otherwise. I still felt absurdly guilty, like I was abandoning her when she needed me, instead of just taking care of my own needs.

Sometimes, feelings aren't about what they seem like they're about.

<I have to,> I said, gentler than I normally would. <Mr. King'll help you back to bed, okay?> Our hands had settled down to grip onto the sides of the PYP. Mr. King hovered dutifully behind us, as if he could hear what I said and wanted to reassure us that he would, in fact, be there to help. I liked Mr. King. Have I mentioned I liked Mr. King? Right then especially. I don't know anyone else who would have done this so patiently, without question or complaint. <If you want to, ask him tomorrow to help you back here, okay?> She didn't answer right away. <Steph? Okay?>

<Okay.>

<Only if you want to.> I don't know why I felt like I needed the extra reassurance, but there it was.

<Okay.>

As it worked out, Steph didn't remember our conversation the next morning. In the grand scheme of things, maybe that was the best thing.

* * *

 

When I first got the portable Yeerk pool, I told Steph that it was about big enough to hold two Yeerks at once. I hadn't really had a specific reason in mind at the time for sharing that information, to be honest. I think I'd already decided to stay as long as Steph would let me by the time we moved in with the Chee--when she finally had a real say in the matter. Since I wasn't planning to vacate any time soon back then, it seemed like good information to give. You never know when we might need it.

Of course, when I say it's "big enough" for two Yeerks, I don't mean it's  _comfortable._ It's like trying to put two goldfish in one of those small glass bowls. Sure, they _can_ move, but they're going to need a lot more space than that. Basically, what I'm trying to say is this: There's really no escaping your one pool mate.

<Oh. It's you.>

<Hello to you, too, Priton Six-Two-Four.> Aftran sounded amused. Well, she didn't "sound" like anything, really, but you know what I mean. <Who were you expecting, the emperor?>

Really, if things had gone the way I'd expected them to--if Steph hadn't gotten sick and I hadn't ended up sidelined during this debacle--I would have suggested to Cassie that we put Aftran in my pool. Obviously, I hadn't exactly had that chance. To Aftran, I said, <I assume if you're here now, Ax is okay.>

<Yes, he's fine now. Unhappy with how it happened, but I guess you'd know about that.>

<Uh-huh.>

There was a pause where neither of us said anything, though we were still connected, palp-to-palp. The thing about Yeerk communication is that it's not really thought speak. Not really. It functions similarly in a lot of ways, but we're not long-range telepaths like Andalites or Leerans or Isk are. We can "hear" thought speak in our minds from those species--or people in morph--but we can't respond in kind without a similarly equipped host. We use our palps to communicate--with each other, with technology, with host brains. It's really somewhere between talking and mind reading--if you're not paying attention, you can communicate a lot more than you intended to. When there's a lot you want to keep private--say, because you have dangerous political views--you either get really good at closing yourself off, or you get used to a lonely, solitary existence.

Not every dangerous viewpoint boils down to "host sympathizing," but it really shouldn't surprise anyone how often the two go hand-in-hand regardless. Yeerks are social creatures who hate isolation, too.

<I'm kind of surprised you're still here,> Aftran said.

<Really? Why?>

<Your host aside, they're not really fans of working with our kind.> 

She wasn't entirely wrong. <It's a work in progress,> I said. <Actually, I'm glad you're here.>

I could feel Aftran's surprise through our temporary link. < _Are_ you?> 

<Yes?> I didn't understand her skepticism.

<The last time you said anything to me, it was 'go fuck yourself.'>

<Oh, that. That was like a year ago.> Or close to, anyway. <But never mind that. What's the plan? What are you going to do now?>

<I don't know. I can't go back without getting killed.>

<Hmm. That's true.> And she couldn't really stay  _here_ either. Neither of us said it, but "two Yeerks in a portable Yeerk pool" was really an "emergencies only" kind of deal. I suppose we could have gotten a bigger container, of course. That would've been easiest--and preferable to say, hitching a ride in a Chee, even if someone was willing--but I wasn't going to suggest it. <You could become a _nothlit_ ,> I said, casually. 

 <I guess. If they're offering.>

<Better than being dead.> 

I felt something like a twitch--a current of something, like static. I think the closest human equivalent is a huffy kind of laugh. 

<Is that _your_ plan?> Aftran asked. <For whenever you're done with this?> 

<Yes.>

It was the first time I'd said as much to anyone besides Steph. The others had asked. Erek had asked. We'd always been vague out of necessity, either because it was too early to tell the whole truth, or because we didn't want to have to explain why I was _still_ here. There were a lot of factors. I didn't want to leave my host, sure, but if it were just that, I'd have sucked it up and done what was probably the right thing a long time ago--or I tell myself I would have, anyway. But there were other things at play, too. Spite. That inexplicable feeling like I was needed. Fear of change. 

I could sense that last one in Aftran, too. Maybe it should have surprised me. I wondered how her conversation with Cassie must have gone in this iteration of things. There were more options now--it wasn't nothlitism or death--but still there were no perfect solutions. Humans, Andalites, they don't understand the choice morphing gives Yeerks--or Taxxons, I imagine, or anyone whose existence they see as "terrible." A human or an Andalite becoming a _nothlit_ is sad--Tobias is a tragedy. Arbron is a tragedy. A Yeerk becoming a _nothlit_ isn't a tragedy, it's a solution. Our biology is a mistake. When an Andalite prince commits genocide or a human teenager murders thousands, neither is a reflection on their species. It's war, and war is hell. All those Yeerks who died in the process? Well, they deserved it, right? They're all complicit in war crimes, whether they had a say in them or not. Whether they've ever had a host or not. There's no such thing as a Yeerk civilian. Losing our bodies, giving up who we are--no one else realizes that's a punishment. That's "freedom." That's "getting off easy." 

I would have liked to have told Aftran that she seemed happy, in that would-have-been future she might have otherwise been promised. But I didn't. As well-meaning as I knew they were, the others were aliens. They weren't Yeerks, and I don't think anyone else could properly understand the volatile mix of ego and self-loathing that that entailed.

<If that doesn't appeal to you,> I said to Aftran, <I might have another job for you.>

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's... a lot happening here but can we take a moment to acknowledge Mr. King as the unsung hero of Going Back. He definitely got puked on off-screen and lives with the three most dramatic people around. What a mensch.
> 
> Cameos from Going Back's Past: A long, long time and many, many edits ago, I gave GB!Steph a dog because really, why not? I think I thought it was funny to name said dog something stereotypically dumb, and so here Muffin is for his probably one-off appearance. He originally showed up around 28-ish, so this particular self-referential joke is at least well timed.
> 
> It occurred to me while writing this chapter that this is the first time in twenty years that I've written Priton having a one-on-one conversation with a member of his own species. Weird. But also kind of fitting that it happens like this, since Priton couldn't exist without Aftran existing as a model for "Not All Yeerks are Evil" (Priton is technically Neutral in D&D terms, it counts) and also... I may have subconsciously named Priton after her? Flip their numbers around a bit. 942. 624. It was mostly unintentional, I swear. I'm just terrible at naming characters.
> 
> If I did my math correctly, we've officially passed the half-way point in the series! ...Like two books ago. Oops. But we're somehow not at the half-way point of Going Back. I'm... not sure how that works.


	6. Bright Clear Line

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is less of a chapter and more of Priton's musings. And foreshadowing. Always foreshadowing. Someday we'll reach the stuff I've been foreshadowing forever and I won't know what to do with myself.

_**Priton** _

What is it about humans that inspires so many aliens to risk our own tails for them?

I mean, it's not _just_ humans--there are stories of inter-species co-mingling all over the place, if you're interested in looking. Aldrea and Dak Hamee, the Ellimist and early Andalites, to name just the stories I know about But in a universe where we're all just stories someone made up, it makes sense that a lot of those inter-species relationships would be human-centric. Humans are just kind of like that. 

Elfangor. Ax. Visser One. Me. I have a hard time believing the four of us are alone in our fascination with and loyalty to humans. It gets complicated and murky and I think most of us are only _really_ loyal in any form to those we're directly connected to, not to the species as a whole, but still. 

It's hard to know what to change and what to leave the same sometimes. Some things don't matter, like whether or not we tried and failed to get down to the Yeerk Pool the night Ax got sick. Some things you know are going to have far-reaching consequences, even before those consequences make themselves evident. Like how, even though all that had _really_ changed just now was that Aftran was taking up temporary residence in my portable pool instead of living out the rest of her days as a whale _nothlit_ , I knew that keeping her on hand was the pivotal thing. However everything else turned out, possibilities had been opened up that had not been there before.

Would I have done the same things if I knew what all of the consequences were going to be? Maybe. I don't know. Ask me again in ten years.

I think about the things that we _don't_ change sometimes. Like, I wonder sometimes if we could have thought harder and found a way to save Eva early. Save Marco from the angst of possibly killing his own mother. Gain us a knowledgeable ally. 

Of course, the flip side of all that was that without Visser One, Visser Three would stand unchecked. An unchecked Visser Three meant all-out war, and frankly I didn't like the idea of bringing that on sooner than it had to happen. It would change too many variables. There's something comforting in knowing the future, in having a say in where things deviate.

That's a lot of power for one person, or even two people, even if it's mostly an illusion. It doesn't free you from the consequences of your actions. 

It'd be nice if we had a road map, of course. If we knew we were on the right track. It's all a game, with rules no one bothers to tell you at the start. But maybe that's not such a bad thing. There's a certain logic to games, once you've been in them long enough to figure them out. There are patterns that crop up, time and again. And, you know, I haven't played many human video games, but I've seen enough of my hosts' memories of ones _they've_ played to know one thing, at least:

The surest way to know you're going the right way? The amount of resistance you're faced with as a result.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title is, of course, an actual reference to #30, but it's also part 1 of "I reference [fanfics](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5432780/chapters/12553694) I like because I can." 
> 
> Megamorphs #3 technically should come between #29 and #30, but excluding it seems like a mercy. For you, the readers. Unless someone was really looking forward to my history nerd rants, in which case I am sorry. I might have included something headcanon-y about the Time Matrix if I could think of a way to make that interesting and plot-relevant.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed this very Priton-heavy Part, because he's not narrating again for... awhile. Definitely not in Part 8, anyway. Stay tuned next for... meta jokes and Everworld references. Those are a miniscule part, but are also the only non-spoiler thing I could think of. I'm excited for all the stuff coming up. I hope you enjoy them.


End file.
